Outsider
by edelweiss123
Summary: When her life collapses, Cris becomes reckless and rebellious. But years later she longs for a a normal life again. She moves in with her Uncle-who just happens to live in Forks. How normal can her life be when she discovers the town is full of Vampires?
1. Encounter

ENCOUNTER

"Will that be all, Ma'am?"

I was checking out at the local Safeway, so it's not like the place was terribly crowded, but I was self-conscious. It felt so weird to be around people again. I still wasn't used to it.

"Yes, thank you," I mumbled. I didn't look the zit-faced teen running the register in the eyes as I replied and I grabbed up my bag and moved to the front of the store at a near dash. For some reason, I felt especially nervous here, and I realized that it was more than what was caused by my discomfort with the people I was sure I felt looking at me. Something at the back of my mind was bugging me, but I wasn't quite sure what. I stopped by the door and pretended to check the contents of my bag—even though I could easily tell everything was in there that should be—to waste time so I could maybe figure out what was bothering me before I left the store.

_Shampoo. Ramen. Razor. Deoderant. Pads. Hairbrush. Toothbrush. Can Opener._

The last was for my Uncle, whom I was staying with here in Forks. He had lost his old can opener, which he needed to eat his nasty lunches of cold pork and beans on the job. He was the overseer of a logging company, and he owned a small, isolated cabin on the side of a mountain. He was only home about three nights a week. He had no wife, a "confirmed bachelor" to phrase it politely. So there were some things lacking at his house for a 16 year old girl.

For some reason-I don't know, maybe it was because he was one of only five people I had actually spoken to since coming back to civilization, or my paranoia-anyway, it caught my attention when the boy running the register spoke to the girl who had just come up to the checkout.

"Oh, um, hey Bella! How's your summer been? I mean, how are you?" His voiced cracked high on the 'hey'.

"Um, pretty good Eric." I wasn't engrossed in their conversation. I really didn't care. But it drew my attention enough that I glanced up at them. There was zit-face, and the girl he was talking to, and then…I looked behind the girl. And it was there. The reason I felt uneasy: my subconscious had been warning me of a danger I hadn't noticed.

There was a monster in the store, behind her. A Vampire.

o o o

Now, I'm sure you're very confused at this point, and I owe you a few explanations. Coming back to civilization? Living with my uncle? Vampires?? Let me backtrack a little here. I'll answer the last question at least, for now. It seems the most important one at the moment.

But before that, my name: Cristen Anna Renhaus, or Cris. More important, you should know that I am not an ordinary human. I can… _feel_ things……_see_ things….. it's….. very hard to explain. I could maybe compare it to X-ray vision, in one aspect: for example, if I look at a car, I see with my eyes what anyone else would see: the exterior of a car. But in my minds' eye I see something very different. In my mind, I can clearly "see" every single internal working part, how they connect, how they work together, and I can also sense the fine layer of dust on the cars' surface, and tell if the tires are too thin, and… you get the point. Simply put, I can detect every single physical element of an object without touching it, with my eyes closed. And it doesn't work on just cars. Everything that exists, I see like this: trees, animals, rocks, buildings, even people. Especially people.

Because with living things, most of all people, I do more than just see: I _feel_. The human body is one of the most complex pieces you could ever imagine. Eventually its constructs get so small that even I can't see how they work, like at the cellular level… Anyway, you don't need the details, just the concept: back to the point, when I am physically close to a person, I not only see how their body works, I feel it, and my body mimics theirs. When people are afraid, or happy, or sad, or angry, or anything else, their body responds. Blood pumps faster. Heart slows down. They get a stomachache. And so forth. It's very annoying. One of the main reasons I left civilization in the first place (like I said-I'll get to that later).

There is a third part to my ability. I can see, I can feel, and… I can control. The hypothetical car I was talking about earlier? If I felt like switching up the wires, carving a hole in the gas tank, disconnecting the battery, I could do all that within a minute and not even touch the thing. So when my body mimics the changes in others, I can manipulate my heart and bloodstream back to a normal rate. But it's risky. The movements are imprecise, and if I didn't know the inside of my own body so well, I would probably accidentally kill myself.

And there is one other flaw. I can control the influence of other's emotions by controlling my physical response. But I cannot control pain. Raw, physical pain. So imagine someone cuts their leg open. Blood starts spilling out of their wound. I happen to be next to them. Their nerves tell _their_ body about the pain, and they tell _mine_. I can't help feeling it. I can't stop their pain, or mine. The only thing I can do is run away—it lessens over a distance. And over time, I have learned to temporarily disconnect myself from the pain center in my brain, but even then, I still feel about a tenth of the pain at best. So walking down the street, living in a city, I know who has a headache. Stomachache. Cramps. Bruises. Sunburn. Arthritis. You get the idea.

I have no idea why I can do this. Why this happens to me. There is no one to ask, and no one to answer.

I don't tell you this so you can pity me. Pity is worthless. And I don't mean to bore you with the freakish sci-fi details of my life. It's just that, if you're going to hear my story, you're going to need to know how I experience my surroundings for any of this to make sense.

And for now, I think you know enough about me. I'll explain everything else later, at a better time. But for now, back to the story: I was staring at a monster.

o o o

Externally, the thing was an unbelievably hot guy. Seriously. Hot. But that didn't distract me—much—from what I was seeing on its' _inside._

There was no life inside it. It was cold. Dense and hard like a stone. Motionless. No heartbeat, no bloodflow. There was no blood in its veins at all, just some liquid I couldn't name. That wasn't to say it didn't have blood, though. In the huge empty cavern of where a human should have had many organs—intestines, liver, kidneys, bladder, stomach, pancreas—was one giant sack connected to the esophagus. And it was full of cold blood.

I would have been freaked out regardless, but I was even more frightened because I knew just what it was. And how did I know what it was? Let's just say I've…."seen their type" before. (Another story for later.)

My first instinct: RUN!

My second instinct: RUN _FASTER_!

But I was frozen to the spot. Then the thing wrapped its dangerous arms around the girl.

"We need to get going, Bella." Its voice was low and eerily smooth. With a shock I realized that what seemed an endless moment of horror in realizing what the thing was, had only been a few seconds, and the conversation between the three—the boy, the girl, and the monster—had had no gaps.

"Hang on, let me pay first." She dug around in her pockets.

"Here, Eric, keep the change." It tossed some money at him.

"Hey!" she shouted.

The thing was pulling the girl swiftly towards the door—towards me—as it simultaneously grabbed the small plastic bag from the checkout.

And, even worse, as it was headed out the door, as it passed me, I looked at it—I couldn't help it.

It looked at me back, just one quick glance, and our eyes met.

Cold anger was frozen there. And fear? For once, my body did not mimic, so I had no idea what it was feeling—could it feel?—and besides, my body was too busy reacting to my own fear to tell.

The door opened and closed; the bell jangled.

I felt their forms moving farther and farther away, and when they got to their car, I was somehow sent even further into shock when I felt a second monster waiting for them there. The car started quickly and they sped away.

And then they were gone.

The shock wore off. And underneath the shock was numbness. Nothing.

I'm not entirely sure how long I stood there, but eventually the zit-faced guy—Eric, I guess—somehow appeared right beside me.

"Are you okay? Do you need something?" I could tell he was genuinely concerned, and… nervous. About what? Did he know, too? Did Vampires have some kind of free reign over this town? My paranoia flared.

I looked up at him, and he blushed. He had glasses, zits, and inky hair. No, he couldn't know. He must just get nervous talking to girls. Great.

It was then that I realized that my mouth had been hanging open all this time, and that I had dropped my bag. I snapped my mouth shut and snatched my stuff off the floor.

"Um, no, I'm…." What _was_ I right now? "…fine." I was definitely not fine.

I made a break for it before he could answer.


	2. Threat

2. THREAT

**EDWARD POV:**

"Anything else you need, love?" I smirked as she blushed and pulled her little red shopping basket to her right side—the side away from me.

"You know, you could have stayed in the car with Alice," she mumbled. We—that is, everyone but Carlise, Esme, and Rosalie; Carlisle, because of his work, Esme, because he was staying, and Rosalie, because Bella was _going_—we were about to go on vacation for a week, and Bella was stocking up on various toiletries that she would need. She seemed embarrassed for me to see them.

"But that would mean I'd have to be away from you." I pretended to frown, but part of me actually was hurt by the idea of separation.

"For like, five minutes." She rolled her eyes, but said no more on the subject. I wished desperately that this meant the idea of separation hurt her too, but I quickly berated myself for it.

I shouldn't wish her pain, and I especially shouldn't wish for her to become utterly bound to me, as I was to her…

I was going to have to leave her someday, when I was strong enough.

My mood had instantly shifted from joy to sorrow, and some of it must have shown on my face.

"Something wrong?" she asked, looking concerned, brows pinching together.

"No, no, nothing's wrong. Just thinking about something…" I trailed off. I realized that this would make her curious, and she would want an exact answer.

"What—" she started, but I cut her off.

"Do you have everything?" I said, pointing to her basket.

I started gently nudging her towards to checkout. She narrowed her eyes suspiciously, but said nothing. I knew she would ask me later. Luckily, I would have time to come up with a believable story before then.

I groaned internally when I saw Eric at the checkout counter. His thoughts exploded into a frenzy when he caught sight of Bella. Before that, his thoughts had been occupied by a girl that had just checked out; he had thought she was pretty. His mind flipped from obsessing over one girl to another faster than changing the channel on a TV. It annoyed me that girls were nearly interchangeable to human boys, and even though his thoughts were not nearly as inappropriate as the Newton boys'—not even close—I had to remind myself not to knock him against the wall.

"Oh, um, hey Bella! How's your summer been? I mean, how are you?" He was too literal in his intent for my liking. But I kept myself still.

"Um, pretty good Eric." She was handing him the two or three items that had been in her basket. He scanned them quickly, fumbling a little with putting them in the bag.

"_VAMPIRE!!!"_

I froze. I waited for everyone in the store to turn and look at me. It took me half a second to realize that the scream had been a mental one. I searched out the mind that had made the scream and found it quickly.

Horror. Hers, and mine. Both for the same reason: she knew what I was.

I looked deeper into her mind and was shocked by what I saw. She was looking straight at me, but she was seeing more than just that. She was seeing…inside me? She could…see?...my frozen heart, my alien physiology…my most recent meal….

Only twice before had someone guessed correctly what we were. One was Bella, of course. But for the other incident we had had to move immediately.

But this girl wasn't guessing. She knew. She _knew_, and could never be convinced otherwise.

I knew the two options: we could move—and it would have to be soon, today, even—or we could kill her.

I immediately regretted the last thought. I remembered with excruciating clarity when my family had had to make this same decision over Bella, and my vehement defense of her. But there would be no one to defend this girl like I had defended Bella. And if Bella ever found out what we had done to keep our secret… I cringed at her would-be fear and disgust. I vowed that I would not kill this girl either, just because she simply knew too much.

But then what would we do?

All of these thoughts happened in an instant. Eric was just putting the last item in a plastic grocery bag. I did not want to worry Bella, so I wrapped my arms around her and said very calmly:

"We need to get going, Bella." The girl was startled, disgusted, and frightened—frightened for Bella, that is—by my hugging a human.

"Hang on, let me pay first." Bella was blushing—from me holding her in public, I surmised—smiling, and digging around in her pockets for some change, which would have to be counted out, and then returned…

The best option now was to get out of here, away from that girl, as soon as possible. I was afraid that if I stayed too long, she might do something: confront me, try to warn Bella, openly accuse me; I didn't know.

I snatched a fifty out of my wallet and threw it on the counter: "Here, Eric, keep the change."

_Wait, a fifty!? That leaves like…. 35 bucks in change! Oh, well. I'M not complaining…_

I started pulling Bella toward the door. The frightened girls' heart increased in tempo as I came toward her.

"Hey!" Bella protested—I knew she didn't like me dragging her around, or buying her things—but I didn't have time for this right now. I had almost forgotten her purchases in my haste, but I grabbed them just before they were out of my reach.

The girl's eyes followed me all the way to the door. I chanced one brief look at her as I passed her.

When I looked directly at her, her eyes opened even wider, and she started to tremble slightly. Her jaw dropped. Her grip on her bag slackened and the items clattered to the floor. She didn't seem to notice. I heard the emotions on my face register in her thoughts.

_Anger? Fear?_

I also heard Bella's heart rate suddenly increase. I turned away from the girl and looked at Bella. She was staring anxiously at the girl, who was still staring at me.

I pushed out of the store, and walked rapidly towards the Volvo.

"What—" Bella started to ask, but the look on my face must have worried her so much that she did not complete the thought.

As we got nearer to the car, I could hear Alice's worried thoughts, too.

_Edward, what happened? What's going on?_

She replayed a vision in her head. In it, I could see myself following the girl down the street and grabbing her from behind, dragging her into an alleyway…

I winced. Then she showed me another vision—a more recent one—where the girl was in the woods, running somewhere.

We had reached the car by now. I quickly helped Bella into the backseat, and then got in the passenger seat myself.

"Edward, why—?"

"Just drive, Alice." My voice was rough with worry. I could tell the girl was still standing in the same spot, frozen with fright, but I did not know how long that would last. Alice had seen her running somewhere, but she couldn't tell exactly where that was. Regardless, we needed to do something—fast.

When we were well on our way home, I relaxed a little, sighing and sliding into my seat. Alice had been searching for the girls' actions, but she had not made a firm decision yet, so the future was still foggy.

She turned sharply towards me.

"Edward. What. Is. Going. On?"

"She knows, doesn't she?" Bella spoke very quietly. Alice and I both turned to look at her.

"Alice, keep your eyes on the—" Alice threw her a disparaging look. "Alright. But Edward…" Her eyebrows pressed down heavily into her chocolate eyes. Her tone was serious. "Does that girl…know?"

I knew what she meant. And I knew that Alice would probably know what she meant, too.

"_Know?_" Alice's eyes were wide.

_About us?_

"Yes, Alice." I responded to her thought. "We have a problem."


	3. Fear

_Nothing to worry about. Just two bloodthirsty monsters abducting some poor innocent girl…_

I was running now. As hard and as fast as I could. I didn't care that people were staring as I rushed down the sidewalk, that cars were honking as I crossed the road without stopping to wait for a gap in traffic.

My bag of stuff was starting to get in the way. I had seriously considered just dropping it, but I had so little money as it was…

I felt a pang of guilt. Here I was worrying about _money_ when someone could be getting eaten at this very moment. I shuddered as the unpleasant memories boiled up in my mind.

_There!_

I saw a blue mail bin up ahead on the sidewalk. As soon as I reached it I opened the hatch and crammed my bag inside of it. I could come back for it later.

_If I wasn't dead…_

I pushed the thought away.

I was almost out of the town limits. It would be much easier for me to think and plan when I finally got to the forest. I felt much more comfortable and at home there than anywhere else.

As I ran, the endorphins from the physical exertion helped calm my mind. I also started focusing on turning my heart rate down to a level that would come from just running track rather than running from a tiger.

I was at the edge of the forest now. I thumped, heavy-footed, to a stop. Partially, it was because I knew I would collapse if I didn't, since I had just run over two miles in less than 7 minutes. But it was also because certain things about my recent encounter were starting to occur to me, and I needed to think with no distractions.

First of all, something that was really bothering me: that monster had called the girl by name. They seemed… _familiar_ with each other. I was not quite sure what that meant, but I knew it meant something

And the clerk hadn't seemed surprised—at least, not that I had noticed—to see the monster standing there with that girl the clerk was so obviously familiar with, too.

And they had a car? Money? I suppose they could have stolen those things, but I couldn't imagine anyone—even the undead—getting away with using a stolen car in a town this small.

One thought, more sluggish and infinitely more important than the rest, finally crept to the surface of my mind.

I had so blatantly been staring at the monster, with who knows what kind of expression on my face. It had known I was staring at it, or else it wouldn't have glared at me. It had been angry, I was sure of that. At first I thought it was for the obvious reason: I was staring at it and it didn't want me to. I would have been mad at anyone staring at me like that, too. But people must stare at "him" all the time. "He" was unhumanly attractive. Girls of all ages probably stared no matter where it went.

So why me? Why did it choose to glare at me?

I had no answer for the moment, but it gave me a sick feeling as I carried the thought with me and started running again, though not as fast as before. I needed to save my strength for what I was about to do.

o o o

It would probably be a good time to explain just how I came to know about Vampires in the first place. I realize it will be a bit annoying for me to just give you a random fragment of my past without telling you about how I got to that point in my life: why I was alone, and homeless, and hungry…

Anyway.

It's a very long story, and depressing to think about. So I'll just tell you about this one incident for now.

I was 14, and as I said before, alone, homeless, and hungry. I was on the streets of Omaha, which, despite being in Nebraska, is not hospitable or folksy in any way. It's a big, bleak city, full of crime, noise, pollution, and people in pain.

At the time, I had not yet found a way to reduce the pain I felt from other's pain, so I was hurting pretty badly already that night. I think it was about nine in the evening (I had stolen a watch); it was summer—though I can't remember what day exactly—so it was still light out, and it was hot.

I was also very tired. I had spent all day searching the city for free food and money—or at least food or money I could steal easily without getting caught. I had found a bag of unopened chips in the trash, stolen a candy bar out of a purse as well as ten dollars, grabbed a half-eaten take-out box of Chinese rice from a car, found three dollar bills, five quarters, two dimes and fifteen pennies on the sidewalk, and to top it all off, eaten a dog biscuit I found in the grass.

Despite the days' spoils, I had managed to burn more calories in finding the food than I got from consuming it. And I needed the money I had for my next drug fix. (Heroin, I think. _Those_ days are mostly blurred together, except for this day and a few others.)

So it was getting dark. I tried to avoid sleeping in the open whenever I could. Luck was with me that night. Earlier in the day, I had noticed a dilapidated apartment building that had an empty room on the fourth floor. It seemed uninhabited, from what I could tell through my special sense. (There was a lot of dust, and no recent trash littered the floor—all the subtle signs of abandonment I had learned to recognize.) But I was still wary as I approached it for the second time that day. I stopped about half a block away, on the sidewalk, and I closed my eyes to see.

As I focused on the building, I could suddenly see in detail all the rooms and spaces of the old place. I watched for a moment as its residents moved about within its walls, making the small, tired motions of their weary lives. It felt wrong, intrusive; like I was a scientist watching all her cages of rats, seeing them scurry about within their confines, with no apparent purpose. I quickly withdrew from all of the occupied spaces and focused only on the room I was looking for.

When I found it, I felt instant relief. It was still empty, and nothing had changed since that morning, so I would be safe to spend the night or longer there. It even had a bed.

I walked silently towards the alley behind the building. There was a set of metal emergency stairs on the exterior of the building that I could climb up to the window of the room, where I could enter without drawing attention to myself.

Well, almost no attention. Just as I started to climb the stairs, I realized that I was not alone in the alley.

I turned and looked behind me. A woman, in her twenties maybe, was standing against the wall, smoking a cigarette. She had egg-yolk yellow hair, a black strapless corset and denim mini-skirt, strappy black heels, way too much make-up, and a perfume I could smell from 30 feet away.

There are only two reasons a woman like her would be hanging out in an alley. One, she was selling drugs. Two, she was selling herself. Judging from her appearance, it was probably the latter.

As I turned to look at her, she glanced apathetically back at me. Our eyes locked for the briefest second—hers were a dull gray that should have been blue—and then we turned away from each other. It was the desperate acknowledging the desperate. We would both ignore the each other's illegal activities, like two members of the same club: but a club that no one wanted to join.

I resumed climbing the stairs, stopping only to avoid being seen when a resident walked by his window. I reached the fourth landing, which stretched within feet of the window to the vacant apartment. I closed my eyes and saw the lock on the window. I carefully turned the mechanism with my mind—just like how I had unlocked that car from the outside earlier that day to get food, only this lock was much simpler.

The lock clicked, and I strained my mind to move the window open. Eventually, it slid all the way open, and I collapsed to my knees. It had taken more energy than I had guessed to break in. I wanted to rest, but I couldn't risk waiting where I was, in plain sight. I got up and stepped onto the railing, wobbled there for a second, then made the slight jump to the window ledge. My heart thumped wildly as I had the sensation of falling backwards, but I grasped the window tightly and pulled myself to safety.

I closed the window and locked it. I was gripped with the notion that someone had seen my acrobatics and would try to follow me inside, though I knew they wouldn't be able to open the window like I had. Still. I was paranoid. (It was hard _not_ to develop paranoia when the world really did conspire to brutalize me every day…)

I realized belatedly that it would be much harder to get back _out_ than it had been to come in, because the railing was higher up than the window ledge. I would have to find a better way in and out…

But I would worry about that in the morning. I was exhausted, and, as usual, hungry. And I was excited to have a bed that night, no matter what condition it was in. I collapsed onto it, lying face down. My nose was assaulted with the noxious odors of alcohol, sweat, and dust.

I turned onto my side then to avoid smelling the bed as much. The sun was just setting, and the last light was coming through the window, reaching to the edge of my bed. I stretched my arm out and let the light touch my fingers. I watched as the narrow stream of light slowly slithered out the window, like it was returning to the sun, leaving me and my dark room behind.

As I lay there, calming my mind for sleep, I began to think about some things that I normally tried to avoid. They were unpleasant things, and I don't feel like discussing them just now. But I had wanted a distraction from those thoughts, and that was why I was paying attention when it happened:

I had closed my eyes and was searching the spaces around me. The people moving about below and above me were much the same as before. I felt a dull ache over most of my body that was caused by my close proximity to all of these people. I tried to figure out what specific pains came from which person, but the pains were too vague and too many to tell. Then I searched in front of me, expanding the scope of my sight to the alley.

There were now two people in the alley.

The hooker was still there, I thought, but another person—a man?—was entering the alley. He headed towards her. A customer.

I groaned. If her room was in this building anywhere near me, I would _feel_ what they would be doing. I was full of dread as she started headed towards the entrance to the building. There was an empty room directly below me, and I knew with my luck it would be hers.

And it was, of course. They entered the room about two minutes later. I could now see more details about the two than before. It was the same woman, I was sure. But the man…

I had just registered that something was very wrong about the man when I was gripped in a sudden, unexpected agony.

I cried out as my arms and ribcage were shattered by an invisible force, as my pelvis was crushed, as my legs were snapped in two. Unspeakable, indescribable pain gripped my body in so many places at once that I couldn't keep track of all of them. A final, burning slash ripped its way across my throat, and the pain tripled for an instant before slowly subsiding.

I realized as I was getting hit with the pain that it was not my own. It was the woman's pain. And I could see all too clearly what was happening to her.

The man—the thing—was wrapped around her, breaking her body in ways I didn't know possible. She might have tried to scream, but her lungs were being crushed by her fractured ribs. Her struggles were meager, and did nothing to stop her attacker as it bent her neck to the side forcefully and crushed its teeth into her throat. I saw and felt the blood leave her body, traveling down the monster's throat and collecting in a pool in its hollow center.

Her movements grew weaker and slower, and our pain was disappearing. A tremor slid through me as I felt the life leave her body, and then she went completely limp.

All of this had taken only about 20 seconds, but it seemed like all of my previous 14 years of life and more had actually been spent living in that moment in time.

My sanity refused to believe what I had just seen, but my sight refused to let me deny it. I now saw the monster in detail. My mind made the connection, and I knew what it had to be, but it just couldn't be.

Vampires couldn't be real. They just couldn't.

It finished drinking. It tossed the poor woman's body aside and exited through the window.

I wanted to scream. I wanted to run. I wanted to warn everyone.

But I was frozen to the bed.

I was gripping the sheets so hard that I bruised my palms. I shifted my head over the side of the bed as my stomach heaved, emptying my last few precious calories onto the floor. I curled up on my side and lay sobbing the rest of night. I did not sleep.

It was a good 14 hours before I left that bed, and two days before I finally left the apartment. All the while I could sense the dead body below me. Someone eventually found the body, and that was when I left. I felt like I couldn't leave until then. I felt obligated to her somehow.

I almost went crazy after that. I wanted to forget everything more than ever. My drug use became more than an addiction. But no matter how many hits I took, that memory was always at the back of my mind.

So now you know. I wish I didn't.

On with the story.

o o o

I was about a half mile into the woods when I reached my destination. The pine trees overhead threw the understory into deep shadow, and despite it being the middle of summer, it was cool and damp. I stopped at the base of an enormous spruce and kneeled in between two of the knobby roots. I brushed away the layers of damp needles and uncovered what I had hidden there earlier in the week, when I first arrived in Forks.

I didn't have a car, or even a driver's license, and my uncle was gone most of the time. So transportation was an issue for me. When I wasn't in a hurry, I walked. But for emergencies—like right now—I had a much faster way of getting where I needed to be.

I pulled the long, glossy orange board away from the tree and laid it on flat ground. It was a lifeguard's rescue board—"borrowed" from a local pool—about four feet long, made of foam, and coated in a strong rubbery plastic. There were large oval holes lining the outer rim of the board—handholds for drowning people—but they were convenient for me.

I stepped a foot away from the board, and concentrated.

The pine needles around the board began to tremble, and then they shot up into the air. Then slowly, slowly, the board wobbled and began floating upward. I stopped it when it was up to my knees.

Bracing myself for lifting the extra weight, I settled myself carefully onto the board, knees first, and then slid down on my stomach. I slipped my feet into the handholds behind me, and gripped the large handhold at the tip of the board. And then I started drifting forward, gaining speed until I was gliding two feet above the forest floor.

I kept my eyes closed as I shot through the forest, relying on my secondary sight to keep me from running into trees. The breeze whipped my face and my hands strained to keep my body from sliding off the board. I stretched my sight as far as it would go, and started searching.

I realized that I didn't know where the monsters would be taking her, so I was going to search the road for them from a safe distance. I was about a half mile into the forest, and I would follow the road in a parallel until I found them.

_Then what?_

I had no clue how I was supposed to actually _save_ the girl. Finding her was one thing, but even though I could move things with my mind, that would do no good on a rock-solid Vampire. I was nearly strained to my limits to be moving my 100 pounds at 40mph.

Maybe if I just played it cool, just talked her away from them…

_Hey! I thought I saw you in the Safeway today! Would you mind coming with me for a second?..._

And then we run—or, fly, rather.

Sure. That would work. I'm sure the monsters wouldn't mind if their entrée took a walk before dinner. And that they wouldn't be able to catch us, and that I would even be able to lift both of our weights…

And that they wouldn't add me to the menu.

I definitely needed a better plan.

But I didn't have time to think of any other options, because right at that second, I nearly flew into a house.

I had been so busy with searching the road, and trying to come up with a plan, that I hadn't noticed it until it was right in front of me. I slammed to a halt about two hundred yards away from the clearing, nearly flinging myself off the board. I backed up until I was about a fourth of a mile into the woods.

Out of habit, I casually searched inside the house. I nearly had an aneurysm when I saw what was there.

The girl from the store was in there. And she was surrounded by _six _Vampires.

What the _Hell_!?How many of those things _were_ there in this freakin' town!?

_Keep calm, just keep calm…_

I took a deep breath and slowed my heart. It was harder to be afraid when your body was calm.

This really didn't change things much. I didn't have much of a chance against just two Vampires, so adding more of them to the equation only lessened my chances of success from 0.02% to 0.01%.

So, what now? Just go up and knock on their door?

_Hi, I'm with the teen girls of America association. I'm taking a survey, so would you mind answering a few questions?_

And then I would ask for the girl first, pull her outside for questioning, and fly.

I realized as I was thinking this plan just how plain stupid it sounded.

I also realized one other thing.

It had been bothering me this whole time _why_ that thing had glared at me in the store. Now, at the worst possible moment, my subconscious tossed me an answer.

It knew that I knew too much.

If I _hadn't_ known what it was, then I would have stared at it in _admiration,_ not fear. It must have been obvious that I was afraid of it.

And now I was mere yards away from its house. If I had gone in there…

I was trembling. I doubted that it would have allowed someone who knew its secret to live.

I started backing away slowly.

But it was too late.

Suddenly, there were only five Vampires and the girl left in the house.

I searched frantically for the other one.

It was outside.

And it was running towards me.


	4. Tensions

A/N – Hey, everybody! Sorry it took me so long to get this chapter out, but I had a few things keeping me from writing this chapter as speedily as possible:

I had no idea how to write from Alice's POV (I hope I didn't screw it up too badly)

I had to get my appendix taken out

I'm going to college soon, so I was kind of busy anyway

Well, here it is, chapter 4. I hope you enjoy it! But no matter what you think of it, PLEASEPLEASEPLEASE**PLEASE!!! **Read and review!!! Any suggestions, criticisms, praise/encouragement, or even just comments—I wanna hear 'em!

4. TENSIONS

**ALICE'S POV:**

"Yes, Alice, we have a problem." Edward's voice was grim.

I gripped the steering wheel tight, and the plastic protested under my strong, tiny hands.

How? How had this happened? Why hadn't I seen anything coming? _I_ was supposed to keep our family safe from dangers like this, and now—

"Alice, don't blame yourself. You can't possibly see everything." I ignored him.

Bella piped up from the backseat: "Edward, what happened? How did she know?"

It was the question I had been planning to ask him myself. Although I had seen two visions of the girl, I still had no idea what had happened, except that she somehow knew our secret.

Edward looked briefly at me, acknowledging that he was speaking to the both of us, and then turned back towards Bella.

"I didn't see--I couldn't tell--until it was already too late," he said apologetically.

"What?" Bella interrupted.

"Well, you know that I normally try to block out all of the minds around me, so I wasn't paying attention to the mind of that girl. If I had been, I might have avoided this somehow..."

_Don't blame yourself,_ I thought at him. _You can't possibly hear everything_. His lips twitched slightly, humored despite the situation.

"Anyway, I wasn't paying attention. I didn't notice the girl until she noticed me. As soon as she... caught sight of me... she knew what I was, and I heard the fear and recognition in her mind." His eyes darted towards mine and then back to Bella's in an instant. "It was loud."

He was editing something, leaving some detail out. Something he didn't want Bella to hear? Another quick look in my direction confirmed my suspicions.

Withholding information was a bad habit of his, and it deeply frustrated me. I hated being kept in the dark. But he told Bella even less than me. That also bothered me. It was my intense opinion that he sheltered Bella too much; he had been furious when he found out that I told her about vampiric conversions, and was upset that Bella guessed at my vision of her becoming one of us. But I thought she deserved to know. She wasn't a child... in a manner of speaking. She was tough, and could handle more than Edward gave her credit for.

"Okay, but _how_ did she know what you were?" Bella said slowly. She wasn't going to be satisfied with an answer like that. I smiled briefly.

Edward looked darkly at me, and then sighed.

"I'm... not quite sure how to explain it, but..." he seemed at a loss for words, which was a rare event for Edward.

"Go on," I prompted aloud. He gave me another dark look.

"She could just... _see_ what I was." He paused. We waited. "She had some sort of... extra sight, almost like," he cleared his throat, "um, X-ray vision, maybe?" I raised my eyebrows; Bella's jaw dropped. He rushed to explain. "That's the closest thing I can think of comparing it to, it's much more complex than that: I've never seen anything like it. In her minds' eye, she sees through things—inside of things—so when she looked at me, she could tell that I..." his voice had dropped low. "That I... wasn't human."

His last word was swallowed up into the uneasy silence that followed. Not a single word was spoken the rest of the short trip home.

I could only imagine what that girl must have seen. I knew that we were physically different from humans, but I was never really quite sure about the extent of it. Carlisle had once tried to take an actual X-ray of Edward, just to see if he could, but the X-rays wouldn't penetrate his skin...

I tried looking ahead for the girl's actions. Nothing. Not even a tiny glimmer into the future.

This was going to be impossible. Not only was I trying to predict the future actions of a complete and total stranger, but the actions of a _human_ stranger, who was apparently scared out of her wits and therefore unpredictable.

True, I had two visions of the girl: but the first vision was actually a vision of Edward and his actions; I had only seen the girl because he had considered killing her for half a second—Edward winced slightly in the seat next to me—and then I had had the vision of her running in the forest... But that really didn't tell me anything.

I sighed.

We were now coming up the driveway, and I had a brief vision of Jasper coming out to see us—he would feel our worry before we even got inside.

As soon as I parked, we flung open our doors, letting out all the bottled tension and setting us into motion.

Edward was helping Bella out of the car—unnecessarily, I might add, seeing as how her cast was off—when, right on cue, Jasper came gliding down the porch stairs. He looked at me first, then at Edward.

"What's going on?" I knew I was pretty worried, but I could tell from the look on Jasper's face that Edward was worried more.

"Family meeting," was Edward's growled response as he walked past Jasper up the stairs, Bella in tow.

Jasper and I approached each other at the same time, locking eyes and then hands.

More often than not, our conversations were silent. I tried to calm myself as I looked into my partner's eyes, and smiled a grim smile.

_Everything will probably be all right, but we've still got a lot to worry about._

His face was solemn, but his mouth was soft and there was a warm burning deep in his eyes.

_Whatever this is, Alice, I will not let it hurt you. I love you so much, too much for words. Do you know that?_

I gave his hand a squeeze and smiled in earnest.

_I do. And I love you too, Jasper._

I pulled his hand up and forward and we ascended the porch quickly together, still hand in hand.

Though we had only been behind Edward and Bella by a few seconds, everyone else was already gathered in the dining room. Emmett, Esme, Edward and Bella were already seated, but Rosalie was standing in the corner of the room farthest from Bella, arms folded, looking disgusted and hostile.

Probably, she was upset that Bella was here, part of the family. And even though Edward hadn't explained anything yet, she also probably had a pretty good guess what this meeting was going to be about—after all, there were only a handful of things that we called a family meeting for, and even fewer that would make us worry—and Rosalie had already made up her mind how she was going to vote. I remembered her behavior at the last meeting we had like this, where the subject had been Bella's fate, and groaned internally.

This was not going to be pretty.

I took the seat next to Edward, and Jasper followed to stand behind my chair.

"All right," Edward began, "all of you are here," he looked at everyone but Rosalie, apparently deciding to ignore her for the moment, "with the exception being Carlisle, of course, whom we will call as soon as this meeting is over. Now," he looked at everyone but Rose again, "as you might have guessed we have a bit of a problem..."

Edward went on to explain what had happened, struggling as he had in the car to describe just what the girl could do. After several failed attempts and many interruptions on Emmett's part, he gave up on it.

"Look, it doesn't matter _how_ she can tell I'm..." he swallowed and looked down at Bella, "Point is, she knows. She knows what I—what we are." He let out a huge sigh and sank back into his chair, winding his arm around Bella in the process. Everyone heard her heart accelerate, of course, but we were used to it by now, and Jasper wasn't thirsty. Although he did shift slightly farther away from her. Just in case.

There was a prolonged silence. I looked at all the faces in the room--Edward looked tired, Bella looked deep in thought; but I doubted she would speak up first. Esme wouldn't either; Emmett was uncharacteristically quiet; Jasper was waiting for someone else to speak first, and so was Rosalie; though her expectant look carried an air of superiority about it.

I guess it was up to me. Sigh.

I asked the obvious: "Well, any suggestions? What are we going to do?" Rose smiled balefully and shifted away from the wall. Edward shifted up in his seat suddenly.

Rosalie's voice had a hard edge to it. "I think we all know, Alice," she looked straight at Edward, "what we must do in these situations. Right?" A low growl started building in Edward's chest. "Oh, but wait, I forgot! I guess this would be _your_ first family meeting, wouldn't it, Bella?" She shifted her gaze toward Bella, who flinched. "Has Edward told you about the rules? How we're supposed to keep our existence secret from humans? No? Then I guess he also didn't tell you that when a human threatens to expose us, we're _supposed_ to—"

By this time Edward's growling had gotten so loud that it nearly drowned out Rose's words anyway, but he cut her off before she could finish her sentence.

"ENOUGH!" He stood up and slammed his hands on Esme's poor table. It nearly gave way. Rose looked at Edward with a sneer.

"What's your problem? She's part of the _family_ now, isn't she? So shouldn't she know the rules?" Normally, I would agree with Rose. But for this particular situation especially, Bella shouldn't have the information thrown at her like daggers from Rosalie.

"NO!" The word squeezed itself out from between Edward's clenched teeth. But Rosalie pressed forward.

"You see, we have only two options. One, is that we move away immediately." Bella gasped. "Two, we kill—"

Edward would've leaped across the table if Jasper hadn't held him back; Emmett was doing the same to Rosalie, though she didn't fight against it. Everyone but Bella was standing now, and talking all at once.

"Those AREN'T the only options! But then again, cold-blooded murder never did bother you, did it, Rose?" Edward spat, leaning against Jasper's restraint.

"Both of you, stop it!" Esme whimpered. She looked distraught.

"Oh, don't you act all high and mighty! Like YOU'VE never killed anyone before! HA!"

"Rose, baby, chill..." Emmett frowned.

Rosalie's face wore an odd mixture of indignant rage and satisfaction. She was enjoying herself.

Truthfully, both Edward and Rosalie loved to argue, especially with each other. But I highly doubted he was enjoying _this_ particular fight.

"Edward..." Jasper warned; and then I could feel the wave of calm that Jasper was putting out. Everyone eased up, though Rose still looked angry and Edward still looked like he was mulling over whether or not he should rip Rose's head off.

And he might have, had the argument had a chance to continue. But at that second I was pulled into a vision.

The dining room, the furniture, my family: all were washed away from my sight, swirling and blending together as they vanished. Utter void replaced the space around me. But I was not left in the dark for long. A wide window of light opened before me, and several brief images flashed across its surface, like flickers of a movie. And then it was over. What seemed like a long time had actually only been mere seconds, and the present came rushing back in to fill the void.

"Alice? Alice?" Jasper was shaking my shoulder. I touched his hand and looked at him briefly.

"I'm fine." Then I looked at Edward. His eyebrows were raised at the vision we just saw.

It was the girl again. And again, it had only been a few quick glimpses of her. She was in the forest, and she was going to stumble across our house…

That was surprising enough. But not what left me speechless.

She was headed towards our house; not on foot, but through the air. She was flying.

_Flying._

Edward and I continued to stare at each other as I tried to process this.

"Edward, what—" Bella spoke up after a brief silence—her voice sounded shaky—but Edward suddenly snapped his head around towards the north and swore under his breath.

"She's here." His eyes narrowed as he focused on the distant mind.

"Who's here?" Emmett asked.

"Who do you think? It's the _girl_, of course." Rosalie was always a little quicker on the uptake than her partner.

"Why? How?" Everyone was confused—including Edward and myself—but we didn't really have time to explain.

"She's debating whether or not to come to the door." Edward murmured, listening.

"Why?" I asked, surprised.

"She thinks…" his eyes narrowed, then widened. "She thinks that Alice and I abducted Bella, and she's trying to figure out a way to get her away from us—all of us." He looked at Rose, Emmett, Esme and jasper. "She knows the rest of you are in here too."

"How does she—" Emmett started, but Bella cut him off.

"Get me away from you? She's trying to, what, save me?" A number of emotions flitted across her face: first surprise, then confusion, then awe, then she looked _touched_ for some reason, but that was quickly followed up by a fear that made her face go white.

"Yes." Edward continued listening.

"So what should we do, then?" I asked, again. And again, Rosalie had her answer ready.

"Well, she's right out there. It'll be easy to—"

"NO!" Edward hissed.

Here we go again…

"We ARE NOT, and will NOT be, resorting to that measure!" He gripped the back of his chair. "Jasper, call Carlisle. He needs to know what's going on." Jasper dialed immediately.

"And then what? Just let her be on her merry way, so she can expose us?" Rose said in a degrading voice.

"No, we're not going to let her leave," Rose's face screwed up in confusion, and she was about to say something, but Edward continued quickly, "BUT, we are only going to keep her here long enough to explain ourselves."

"Carlisle isn't answering…" Jasper dialed again.

"_Explain ourselves?!_ So, what, just come right out and _tell_ her we're Vampires?!" Rose's voice shot up to a pitch that may have cracked the windows—if our windows weren't bulletproof, of course.

I was skeptical. And nobody else—except Bella—looked like they were quite happy with this plan either, especially Jasper. His past had taught him to be very rule-conscientious.

"We won't really be telling her we're Vampires—she already knows that. And because she already knows that, there's no way we can lie to her. And there's no way I'll let you kill her." Bella flinched as Edward actually came right out and said what he wouldn't let Rosalie finish saying.

"So our only option is to talk to her, and tell her the truth. She knows what we are, but she doesn't know that we _don't kill humans_," he looked emphatically at Rose. "If she knew that, then she might calm down. And then—" Edward snapped his head towards the girl. "Dammit! She's leaving." He started running towards the door. "I have to go convince her to listen to us—Jazz, keep trying Carlisle's phone—Em, don't let Rosalie follow me." He was out and gone in an instant.

The room was in a tumult after he left. Rosalie was throwing a tantrum—there was no other word for it—Emmett was doing his best to keep her calm, Jasper was getting frustrated that Carlisle wouldn't pick up, and the rest of us were just plain confused.

"Wait, why is she leaving?" Bella asked nobody in particular.

"Jasper, has he picked up yet?" I asked.

"No, it just goes straight to voicemail. He must have his phone turned off. I'm going to try calling the hospital." Jasper called and got through the first try. He was busy talking to someone on the other end, trying to get to Carlisle, when I was swept up in another vision.

I saw the girl fleeing from Edward, headed east, going faster than I would have thought possible. Edward was about to catch up; the girl started to sway, and almost fell off her board. She had reached the road, and continuing in her straight path, shot forward into the middle of it at the worst possible moment…

"Oh, no…" I gasped as the vision closed, the screech of tires against pavement still ringing in my ears.

"Alice, what is it?" Jasper was shaking me slightly and looking me in the eye.

"_Hello? Hello? Jasper? What's going on? _" I could hear Carlisle's voice coming from the phone.

I reached for the phone and Jasper gave it to me. "Hello, Carlisle? It's Alice. Listen, you need to come home _right now_, okay? I don't have time to explain, so just turn your phone on and Jasper can tell you what's going on while you're in the car." I tossed Jasper the phone as I headed out the door.

"Alice, what—" But I was already out the door before he could finish his question.

I had seen the girl fly out into the middle of the road just as a truck came speeding by. I had seen her body flying through the air after the front of the vehicle had collided with her ribcage. And I had seen her lying on the ground, clutching her side as the truck took off down the road. It was a hit-and-run.

I wasn't sure what I was going to do: I didn't think I would be able to stop the accident before it happened, and I wasn't sure what good I could do once I got there.

But I had to try.

My heart sank as I heard the collision in the distance.

And even from here, I could smell the blood.

A/N – By the way, if it wasn't clear enough in the story, this is supposed to take place in the summer between Twilight and New Moon. And just another reminder: Please R&R!!! Thanks!


	5. Colors

5. COLORS

Death. It always comes for you when you least expect it.

And I have seen this fact hold true so many times that I probably shouldn't have been surprised to be... well, surprised by my own death. (_Blindsided _is more like it.) But then again, I was more than a little occupied.

After all, when Death is raging towards your fleeing backside at upwards of 300 miles per hour in the form of an unhuman, flesh-eating monstrosity, the very _last_ thing on your mind is an elementary traffic safety tip.

Irony. It's entertaining, and an essential part of a well-balanced story. One of my favorite elements of literature.

Not so fun in real life, though.

I can't remember if these disjointed thoughts came to me during these events or while contemplating them afterwards, or a combination of the two, but at some point I remember a sudden change in direction.

Then, a flash of light.

Then, flying through the air, faster than normal.

And then, blackness.

And then, pain.

The black would turn red and white and yellow, and the levels of pain would fluctuate with the colors.

All I could see were the colors.

Eventually, the black, and the lowest level of pain that accompanied it, became dominant.

And I knew I was dying.

Maybe this is when I had my thoughts on Death, because although I felt myself fading away, I had a strange sense of clarity. Almost like peace, only less reassuring.

And maybe that's also why fear could still register in my thoughts when I heard _that voice_.

"Don't move." It was low, it was commanding, and sent a numbing sensation rocketing through every pathway in my body.

Suddenly, with the aid of what must have been adrenaline and my other sense, I was hyperaware of my own body and surroundings.

On a road. Forest. Vampire. Car speeding away. Broken ribs. Can't feel right arm. Vampire. Nearly-punctured lung.

"Get away..." I croaked. Maybe. I thought it, anyway.

But I must have said it out loud, because it answered me:

"Don't move. I won't hurt you, I'm just trying to help..." it droned on in that eerie rich voice.

I tried to laugh at its' words. Help me? But my only retort was to cough up blood.

I vaguely noticed that it had stopped talking.

I turned my thoughts inward to get a better look at my lung. The 4th, 5th and 6th ribs of my right side were cracked, and the 7th was snapped in such a way that it was now digging into my lung, almost pushing all the way through. If I moved, my lung would collapse.

My most urgent need at that very moment was to be able to move and to _get the hell out of there_, so despite the monster not three yards away from me, my focus was to reset my broken rib so I could run without maiming myself.

At least until I passed out. And it caught and killed me anyway.

If it didn't kill me before then. If I could even run after what I was about to do.

But no more time to think: one, two, three...

I couldn't even let myself scream as I shoved my own ribcage back into place.

More red, red red white hot oh my mother-burning red white pain make it stop please God red white white yellow...

Blackness.

Bliss.

**A/N: **I am soooooooo sorry for my lateness, and the extreme shortness of this chapter, but I thought I should get this out A.S.A.P. since it's been so long that i've probably lost what few readers I had... oh well. It's just been so long since I've had any inspiration to write on this, but.... well, here it is, anyway.


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